Sunday, March 29, 2009

Sunshine Cleaning

Sunshine Cleaning deals with the relationship between two sisters with a troubled past, and uncertain future. Amy Adams plays Rose, who cleans houses for a living, and Emily Blunt plays Norah, who emotionally, seems barely competent to do anything. When they learn that cleaning up after crime scenes, suicides and other such messes can be quite lucrative, they decide to go into this business for themselves, with some success. Ms. Adams plays the older more responsible sister who needs to be successful not only to support herself and young son, but to also impress her former high school friends, who've obviously achieved a much greater degree of success than she has, either in marriage or career. The film is certainly enjoyable, but I could have used a little more on the relationship between the two sisters. Also there's a storyline concerning Norah and the daughter of a dead woman whose house they had to clean/detoxify that's kind of pointless and does nothing to advance the story. Mary Lynn Rajskub plays the daughter, and too bad Jack Bauer couldn't haven't swooped in to pull her out. Alan Arkin plays the two girl's weary, yet devoted father, and is the highlight of the film in this supporting role. Sunshine Cleaning, while worth seeing, is certainly not a must see. If you particularly enjoy watching a real pro like Mr. Arkin, then I would definitely see it.

Rating - 3 (Light)

1 comment:

Carol McNiff said...

I liked this movie for the same reasons you did. A little Sundance like film, but not really up to "Little Miss Sunshine", a film with which it is being compared. Alan Arkin is in both and I guess they are using his always interesting performances to sell it. All the actors are easy to watch; conversely the cleaning scenes pretty gruesome-I would say worse than any in Pulp Fiction. I also liked the little boy who played Rose's son. The last scene was just too predictable for me. A light 3 rating is fair for this one.